Sean and I met an English/Canadian couple called Michelle and Martin on our bus from Manzini to Maputo. We hit it off with these guys instantly. Michelle is originally a Brummie, but now lives in Canada for a long term working for Cancer Research. Martin is Canadian and has designs to set up his own tour company doing tours around BC.
The journey to Mozambique was actually very quick and thankfully we weren't the 4 people squished in the back seat (they were all a little on the large side so room was not forthcoming). The border crossings were drama-less and all was looking good. We started walking to the backpackers that we'd planned to stay at only to be told after our few km walk that they were full. So we gave in and the 4 of us shared a cab to another option. Turns out that Fatimas Backpackers, despite it's tarnished Trip Advisor reviews was actually very nice with a dog so wrinkly I thought he was a blanket.
We headed off for a view of the area after settling in and discovered that Mozambique has retained it's Portuguese roots where pastries and bread are concerned! They have this round roll that's almost like a ciabatta bread available at Pastelarias all over the place. We also found the local market full of hairdressers, men sewing everything, fruit and veg galore and of course - bars. Michelle, our resident Portuguese speaker, quickly made friends with the Mama of one place and we hooked into the local brews - 2m, Manica and Laurentina Preta. After negotiating a take-away deposit for the bottles that we promised to bring back we headed off in search of some food (which we found in the form of a rather small hamburger with cold chips) and promptly settled ourselves back at Fatimas getting sloshed. We even met a German family who were very interesting to talk to. It was a great first night in our final BigTrip country.
Unfortunately the sleep wasn't as good because their dorm door was very squeaky and so all movements woke me up. But hey ho, such is a travellers life.
The next morning we got some photocopies of our passports and had them notarised so that we complied with Mozambique law of always having a copy of your ID on you. We thought this was going to be a difficult process when we discovered the room choc-full of locals, but turned out that it was super quick, cheap and not at all formal as they didn't even want our passport originals when they notarised the copies. We must have looked trustworthy indeed.
Having then returned the empties, Sean went to get a haircut and beard shave. The place we found did the single most professional job on Sean's hair that we've had the entire trip. All for about £2. Michelle got a bag sewed up and we nipped in to pay our respects to the Mama of the bar we were at the night before.
Then we returned to Fatimas to make our way back to the first backpackers we'd tried the previous day as it was cheaper than Fatimas and price always wins!
After settling into their dorms and being nicely surprised by their cheap honesty fridge of beer, we set of on a city walk using a route from the Lonely Planet as a guide.
First up was the Fort. Not that big, not much in English, but a good place to people spot from its roof. We discovered some local food stalls and headed over there for a soda where we drank Passionfruit sodas, something we hadn't had since Malawi and sorely missed! We also noted that they did a very good smelling rice and chicken dish for 50 Mets which is incredibly cheap for Mozambique.
We then headed off to the Money Museum which surprised all of us by how much it had on display and how interesting it was. Not only did it contain centuries' worth of local currency, but also currency from around the world, including a $1 Aussie Dollar note (which Sean hadn't seen for years), a 50 trillion Zimbabwean note and many more. I also found it fascinating that in all the pictures of people making money back at the turn of the 20th century every single man had a moustache. Was it uniform I wondered? Along with the tie?
Next up was the train station which is cited as being in the world's top ten most beautiful train stations. It wasn't ugly, but it wasn't as amazing as this quote would have had me believe. In fact, we found the scary looking statue of a lady with eyes that would pierce iron (and, Sean noted, the incredible high-beam boobs!) more interesting.
Then we were hungry. But could we find any street food? Could we heck. We walked and walked and grew more and more hungry. In the end we just gave up, got on a chapa (minibus) and headed up the the fish market where the Lonely Planet has you believe you will find great deals that they'll cook up for you at nearby stalls. Well, you can buy fish. And they will cook it for you. But it's not a great deal. In fact, it's expensive. Especially when you consider that you need to buy rice/bread/herbs on top of the fish to make the meal into something. I fear that they have recognised the trade of tourists and so it has lost its appeal.
So we headed back to base (and our backpackers was actually called Base Backpackers) and made do with some pizza slices near to our accommodation. The food hunt had put a bit of a dampener on the day. But, Michelle and Martin had an ace card up their sleeve in the name of Carcassonne. Now this is a type of board game that requires strategy and cunning. And it's medieval themed. So Sean and I were instantly hooked and the world was once again at peace. We even met a chap named Alan that night that had stayed with Michelle and Martin in Swaziland.
The next day we continued our walk by heading to the main roundabout on which is a church. The church is a beautiful bit of architecture and looks great against the blue skied tropical setting. And using Michelle's powers of Portuguese speech we managed to get the doors opened up so we could climb the tower. This was a pretty scary experience in itself as we ascended the metal spiral staircase that wobbled with rust. The tower ledge was narrow with only one bar of handrail to save you from instant death, but the views of the city were worth it!
Having survived, we then headed off to the art gallery where we saw works by Malangatana Ngwenya, a most prominent Mozambican artist who died only this year. It was very interesting. There was some amazing sculpture work and also some very troubled death scenes. Also a rather odd installation of drums. Random.
Not as random as the art installation we then bumped into at a local theatre type place just opposite. Think many paper boats of different colours reminiscent of the arrows from Dad's Army surrounded by white with piles of cigarette butts.
We passed by the Iron House, designed by the Mr Eiffel of Eiffel Tower fame. Unfortunately he'd never been to Mozambique so didn't quite realise that iron wasn't a great building material in tropical climes.
We learned from yesterday's lessons and tucked into the best and cheapest chicken and rice in town for lunch back near the fort before trying to find a local jazz place to visit that evening. Unfortunately there wasn't much on that night so we got a bus back to near our accommodation, wandered around that area a bit more (its a bit posher down by the coast), and popped by a local art co-op whose gallery was under renovation so we only got to view the artists at work for a little while before heading back home for more Carcassonne with Alan.
And that drew our time in Maputo to a close. We're heading up the coast for our first beach experience in Tofo tomorrow where I'm expecting good weather, white sands and turquoise waters! Watch this space!
Here are the photos:
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| BT82_Maputo 20 -22 June 2011 |
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